The key to a happy life is to ‘be more Yorkshire’, research shows

If you’ve ever met a Yorkshireman, you’ll know that one thing they never tire of is telling anyone who’ll listen (and anyone who won’t) how amazing their home county is. It’s got proper tea, they invented the Yorkshire pudding, they don’t suffer fools, and they are responsible for approximately 100% of any sporting success that England/Britain may achieve – remember the London Olympics?

But, on Yorkshire Day of all days, it now appears that they may have actually been speaking the truth, as new research suggests that the key to finding happiness is to act more ‘Yorkshire’.

A study of 2,000 British adults, released by Sheffield-based Plusnet and conducted by YouGov, revealed that the key personality traits we associate with Yorkshire are ‘straight talking’ (55%), ‘down-to-earth’ (54%), ‘proud’ (38%) and ‘friendly’ (38%). Hard to argue with any of those.

And it transpired that people who identified with those traits were found to be happier than those who did not.

People who identify with being ‘proud’ and ‘friendly’ are 5% more likely to say they are happy compared to the national happiness average (81% vs 76%), while those who describe themselves as ‘down-to-earth’ are 4% more likely to be happy.

Geoffrey Boycott, celebrating Yorkshire being great

If that wasn’t enough, the research found that Yorkshire traditions also make you happier.

Nearly a third of people from Yorkshire drink more than three cups of tea a day (32%) and over a third eat a roast dinner once or more a week (36%) – and people who regularly eat a roast dinner are 9% more likely to say they are happier than their peers compared to the national average.

A massive two thirds of them (66%) eat a Yorkshire pudding at least once a month and almost half of them (47%) eat gravy at least once a week – and, again, those who indulge in gravy goodness at least once a week are 4% more likely to be happier.

The Yorkshire pudding is, indeed, definitely still the correct name for it, with people in Yorkshire twice as likely to eat them at least once a week compared to the national average.

Just one fly in the ointment though – where else are Yorkshire traits most commonly found outside Yorkshire? Well, that would be across the border in the North West – and the red rose county of Lancashire, where almost half (48%) said they were straight-talking, over a quarter (28%) said they were proud and two-thirds (66%) said they were down-to-earth.

That might bring the happiness levels down a bit, sorry guys.

(Image: Rex)

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Dave Fawbert

ShortList.com staff writer Dave’s primary passions are pop, prose, punning and power ballads (and alliteration). A lower division football enthusiast and long-suffering cricket fan, he is one of only 110 people followed on Twitter by Chas Hodges from Chas ‘n’ Dave. Follow Dave on Twitter like Chas: @davefawbert